If I were them i'd fire the marketing guy. Why make a big announcement and then not answer any questions about it or really acknowledge it at all? Can anyone from Aerodyne provide an update or any basic information about this canopy?

This is common in the marketing world. If your product isn't ready yet, but you think some potential customers might buy it, release just enough info to maybe make them wait instead of buying someone else's. It is a dirty trick, and Aerodyne should treat us all better than that.

The ZULU is the totally new high performance, non cross braced, 9 cell canopy now being introduced by Aerodyne. It was designed using Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) simulation software using sophisticated aerodynamic principles to create a versatile high performance aerofoil.

With the ZULU, the canopy pilot gets consistent and positive on heading openings. It is elliptical at both the nose and the tail, with a tapered wing, and it is highly responsive to toggle, riser, and harness input. Like a great sports car or an aerobatic airplane, it does exactly what it is told to do. The ZULU does not exhibit the temperamental nature of some high performance canopies which can be prone to radical openings and oversteer. It is a parachute that is easy to fly with precision.

With that said, it is a performance canopy and not intended for the inexperienced canopy pilot. The more experienced skydiver will appreciate the ZULU’s capabilities and should be prepared for the exhilaration of a canopy that can make your heart pound as you put it through its paces.

The ZULU is a well-mannered high performance canopy and is suitable for many disciplines. Our test team made hundreds of jumps on ZULUs which included wingsuiting, big way, and camera jumps.

We selected a pool of expert test pilots and did exhaustive head-to-head comparisons with the leading parachutes in the same class. The ZULU emerged as the preferred canopy among the test pilot group. With test wing loadings ranging from 1.3 to 2.2, the ZULU was stable in all conditions, and it exhibited great control response with brakes stowed. The electronic monitors calculated the Zulu’s best glide of 4.26 to 1 as the highest canopy glide ratio in the class. At the same time, the ZULU turned and dived more aggressively than the other canopies, showing both a greater increase in speed and carving through more altitude in a 360° turn.

When you are flying a ZULU, the canopy flight is where the fun begins! The ZULU will provide the most fun and the least stress of any high performance canopy on the market…

That's a bit more informative! Sounds like it fits in where the Vision used to in the product line - much more gas than the Pilot, not as mental as the Mamba (which seemed like a hoot to me, but, er, a bit... twitchy).

I hear there have been some demo Zulus doing the rounds in the States, has anyone on dz.com had a go?

I'd definitely like to try it, hopefully Herman or someone like him will be here in the Summer.

So I don't know if they just mean they are using Vectran, or have some other company's product available.

Looks like they added more detail about the suspension lines. Details below.

Along with the all-new ZULU aerofoil, we have developed an all-new premium line type, a highly ordered structured thermoplastic polymer, the new ZLX.

You will be impressed by the soft and supple feel of the line, which is not as brittle and abrasive as other high performance lines. It has shown us remarkable strength and endurance in a year of jump testing. It maintains the feel of the line over hundreds of jumps without pilling like some lines can show over time. It provides no shrinkage and a longer life than lines currently available in the market. The ZULU will come standard with the new ZLX 700 lines.

I jumped it last weekend, but didn't get enough jumps due to weather to really test the canopy. Loaded it right around 1.7. One thing I noticed was it had very light riser pressure and responsive on toggles when you told it to go. It was very stable and had on heading openings. They say it has a shorter recovery arc like a stiletto but I've never jumped one of those to compare it.

I was one of the test jumpers, I probably have ~100 jumps on the canopy over the last year or so. I'm about 230lbs out the door and was jumping a Zulu 132 - so a wingloading of ~1.75.

My normal canopies are a Sabre2 150, a Katana 135, and a Pilot 150. I also jump a Velo 120 but that's not even remotely close so I won't do that comparison. ;-)

My very first impression was "this thing reminds me of a Stiletto" - but that's not a complete picture by any means.

Openings: are quick but not hard. It opens much much faster than my Sabre or Katana, but I've never had one that even remotely "hurt". If you're used to the long snivel that you get from the Katana/Sabre you'll be surprised, but when you realize you get probably 300 feet of vertical distance back at the bottom of a skydive, there are times (cough, cough: BIGWAYS) that this is really really nice to have. My experience is that it opens mostly on-heading, it's easier to control through the opening sequence than my Katana, but a little more twitchy than the Sabre2.

Full flight airspeed seems about the same forward speed as the Katana (maybe just a touch slower?) but what you really really notice is how incredibly flat the glide angle feels. I'm not sure of the exact trim angle, but this canopy is MUCH flatter than anything I've jumped from PD. The stiletto might be close, but this might be the flattest "normal trim" canopy I've ever jumped. This is also a great thing to have when you're working back from a long/bad spot, or when you want to stay up above the crowd.

Riser pressure is higher than the Katana, toggle pressure seems roughly equivalent. Rolling into turns feels similar to Katanas or other ellipticals. The zulu does roll OUT of turns a lot more quickly, though. The dive, however, is COMPLETELY different. The Zulu has a much, much shorter recovery arc than the Katana and is also noticeably shorter than the Sabre2. This is NOT to say that it's boring or slow - you can definitely build up a good bit of speed if you load it up, but given that my reference point was the longer dive of the katana and sabre2 I ended up rolling out of my final turn consistently high.

Landings: Once I made enough jumps to get the landings dialed in, they're *really* nice. The canopy has substantial flare power, and generates good speed from a front riser turn without a tremendous amount of pressure. At 1.7 wingloading it wasn't possible to get it completely stopped with no wind, but my contention is that if you're jumping an elliptical at 1.7 you better be good enough to run/slide out your landings if there's no wind anyway. I've noticed no really bad habits on final/flare, and the control range on toggles seems to be about "medium" - contrast this with the stiletto which seemed like it went from full-flight to full-flare in about 8" of toggle movement.

Packing: relatively easy to pack for a brand new canopy: the fabric isn't as slippery as brand new ZP. Pack volume was a little larger than my Katana 135 but smaller than my KA-150.

Who would want this canopy: a competent canopy pilot looking for something that opens quickly with little or no snivel (again, NOT hard), flies very flat across the ground, and lands well. I can't speak to how it behaves at lower wing loadings, my gut feeling is that if you're not loading this at at least 1.4 or 1.5 you're probably on the wrong canopy anyway.

Who would not want this canopy: someone who wants to generate maximum airspeed in a high-performance landing. It does NOT dive like a Katana will, and the much shorter recovery arc is a very different feeling.

Completely editorial comment: one mistake I made when testing this out was bouncing back and forth between the katana/sabre2 and this wing. This is a bad idea because the PD canopies have a very "similar" feeling through the landing turns and flare - but that feeling is VERY different than the Zulu. Bouncing back and forth made it really hard to keep "dialed in" for how they behaved respectively. Now when I train with two rigs, I try to make sure I'm jumping either an all-Aerodyne combination (Pilot/Zulu) or an all-PD combo (Sabre2/Katana). They are all really good canopies when loaded correctly and flown competently, but the two manufacturers have very different feel and very different turn initiation and recovery arcs.

it's hard for me to say because I wasn't jumping them both at the same time (as I was with the Katana/Sabre2). I couldn't accurately describe the Stiletto vs. the Zulu other than the comment that the first thing I thought was truly "this reminds me of the stiletto".

Sorry for a less-than precise answer... my gut feeling is "they're pretty close" but I also can't say that with nearly as much confidence as the comparisons between the other canopies.

Aerodyne visited my drop zone, and I had a chance to demo the new Zulu all weekend! I have previously only jumped Pilots (124 and 132) loaded around 1.4... After jumping it all weekend (on both aff jumps and video jumps) I instantly put in my order, it's exactly what I was looking for. Great consistent openings (even when I packed it, and even when I pitched shortly after a track). The toggle pressure felt the same as the pilot to me, but where I really noticed the difference was harness input. Much more sensitive to harness input, and much more responsive to riser turns. (fyi: I don't swoop, nothing high performance). It got me back from looooong spots just as my pilot has and the flare felt much more powerful than the pilot. It has a new line type (ZLX) which I don't know much about but it was explained to me that they aren't supposed to stretch and should last longer. Just my 2 cents from your average canopy pilot and loves the new Zulu :)

The demo Zulu canopy we got opened so damn hard nobody wanted to jump it. It seemed to fly OK, kinda like a Pilot. Sent it back, no interest here because of the openings and we even tried larger sliders.

The demo Zulu canopy we got opened so damn hard nobody wanted to jump it. It seemed to fly OK, kinda like a Pilot. Sent it back, no interest here because of the openings and we even tried larger sliders.

Do you have video of the openings? I like quick openings and that leaves me with pretty much only older canopies. My current canopy is about to take it's last breath soon.